Crown Estate Bill [HL]

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 5th November 2024 Lords Chamber

I say to the Minister: please think again; please accept this tiny amendment, which could make a huge difference to the wild population and to the conduct of the salmon farms. We should remember that those farms are producing food that is eaten on a substantial scale now. Therefore, the way in which those salmon farms are managed, the chemicals that are used on them and the consequences of overstocking for the fish are important. I shall give a recent example. I am not repeating myself; I did not give this example earlier. A select committee from the Scottish Parliament was due to visit a farm in Scotland but, unfortunately for them, activists filmed thousands of dead fish being dumped prior to the visit by those important parliamentarians. No doubt that was entirely coincidental, but we are dealing here with an industry where the death rate among the fish can be anything from 25% to 40%. So this is about not just environmental issues but animal welfare issues. I beg to move.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, on this day, 11 years, 2 hours and 20 minutes ago, I was introduced to your Lordships’ House, and I think that having signed this amazing amendment is a good way to celebrate those 11 years, 2 hours and 20 minutes.

I have spoken many times in your Lordships’ House about food and animal welfare and other connected issues, but I did not imagine that all this time later we would be talking about such a truly disgusting issue. I admit that I did not know all that much about it, but I know more now. I have seen the photographs of fish that have been eaten through by lice and the amount of debris that ends up on our seabed. It is unbelievable that we are allowing this.

Probably most of us eat salmon. I can only say to noble Lords: do not eat salmon unless it comes from Iceland or Canada. One noble Lord told me earlier that listening to the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, made him feel sick—and I am sure that was for the right reasons.

I spoke at a PETA meeting just before this—that is, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals—and used salmon farming as an example of how far we still have to go to live up to our reputation as a country that cares for animals. I argue that this is a very damaging situation. I hope that the debates on the amendment, today and in Committee, are read, understood and acted upon by the Crown Estate commissioners and the salmon farming industry.

It is clear that the current rules for the Crown Estate are not good; they are not good enough for the environment or for animal welfare. Although I imagine that the leases are quite profitable for the Crown Estate, they are shameful. A spotlight has been shone on these harmful factory farms, where fish are riddled with sea lice, pumped full of antibiotics and fed with pellets crammed with other, smaller fish, causing damage to their populations. The salmon can have double-digit mortality rates. Plus, these fish farms are detrimental to our native salmon populations, which are already at risk of collapse.

There is also damage to the seabed around these farms and damage to the ocean’s ecosystems. We still know very little about the ocean—it is apocryphal that we know more about the surface of Mars than we do about the ocean—so we really should not be doing this to our seabed; we can imagine the amount of damage that tonnes of faeces, drugs, antibiotics and corpses can do to it. That is horrific.

It is unconscionable that the Crown Estate should be profiting from such a harmful industry. As the Minister accepted in response to this amendment in Committee, the existing laws and regulations clearly are not working to protect to salmon populations from this toxic industry. I hope he has thought more about that and can give an update today.

In his opening remarks on day 2 in Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, called this a modest and uncontroversial amendment. Having looked more closely into this issue, I say that the amendment is absolutely necessary, and it would be unforgivable of the Government not to accept it.

[Lord Strathclyde (Con)]

My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, who has just spoken. She said that this was a very important amendment. I also support my noble friend Lord Forsyth, who spoke with great logic about the amendment he has proposed today and, indeed, the one he proposed in Committee, which had the benefit of being exactly the same.

When I listened to the Minister wind up the debate in Committee, he said:

“The Government wholeheartedly support the objectives behind these amendments.”—[Official Report, 22/10/24; col. 565.]


He did not say that he supported the amendments, but he did say that he supported the objectives. I was immensely encouraged to hear from my noble friend Lord Forsyth that a meeting had taken place. At that meeting, the Minister could say why he was not accepting them or indicate to my noble friend the kinds of tweaks and changes he could make that would make them more acceptable. But what has not changed in logic is that this is a very controversial issue and damage is taking place around the shores of this country.

I too should have declared an interest as being a salmon fisherman, although not a very good one.

I hope that the Minister, when he winds up, can be even more encouraging to my noble friend. The Government have had plenty of time to reflect and reconsider. My noble friend Lord Forsyth talked about a balancing duty. Surely that is an immensely important factor that we ought to take into consideration. My noble friend has laid out what that duty should be. In itself, it will enhance the reputation of the Crown Estate and I very much hope that the Minister will take all this into account when he winds up and, I hope, accepts the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Earl. He may be disadvantaged, compared with others in this debate, because he is not—I do not think—a salmon fisherman. If he were, he would know that English salmon go through the Crown Estate waters up into Scottish waters, where there are salmon farms. Therefore, this amendment does impact on English salmon. There may be only one salmon farm, but if he was concerned about preserving salmon which occupy the rivers in England, he would be much more enthusiastic about this amendment than he appears to be. My noble friend Lord Douglas-Miller, who was chairman of the Atlantic Salmon Trust, has done wonderful work on this, so I am afraid that the noble Earl will not get away with the idea that, because there is only one salmon farm in English waters, a duty on the Crown Estate commissioners to consider the environmental impact has no impact on salmon south of the border.

I will repeat a point made earlier in the debate. In response to the amendment of the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, with enthusiastic support from the Front Bench, we agreed that there should be an exchange of views between the commissioners and that they should learn from each other. We have also heard from the Minister how the Scottish Government are utterly complacent about this. We have seen the results of that and the near extinction of this noble fish, the salmon.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

Pollution of the seabed does not exist only in Scotland, obviously. It will move around.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

I am very grateful to the noble Baroness—I feel I should call her my noble friend. I find I am being asked to have meetings with the activists who film the salmon farms illicitly. I will have to go on a protest march if the Government do not accept this amendment. I know that the Minister has done everything he can on this, but I do not think the response is satisfactory. I beg to test the opinion of the House.